Tapestry
by DistractibleDingo
Summary: It won't be long until Moana finds her people some new islands, establishes some new villages, and begins to settle down, preparing to become their next great chief. But before all that, Moana has a rite of passage to complete, and who better to talk to about that than her best friend? AO3 cross-post. [Part 4 of the fanfic series, Where You Are.]
1. Chapter 1

_Alternatively, Everybody's Changing (And I Don't Feel the Same)._

A cross-posting of a fic I put up on AO3 in June 2017.

 **Part 4 of the fanfic series,** _ **Where You Are**_ **.**

* * *

 _"Get the rope!" Maui cried._

 _Lunging, Moana was able to pin down the end of the rope before it went overboard. She pulled it back slowly, hand over hand, fighting the wind with every tug to swing the sail and the boom back over the boat. She was definitely going to get blisters, but she didn't care. Meanwhile, the canoe was rocking more and more. With a swoop, the outrigger was dunked under the water._

 _Maui sputtered, coughing out water as he resurfaced. "Maybe I could try to teach the chicken."_

 _"Well, your tattoo thinks I'm awesome and he's better-looking," Moana said, winking at Mini Maui. The little guy smiled smugly at Maui._

 _"Tattoos can be removed," Maui muttered darkly._

From _The Story of Moana: A Tale of Courage and Adventure_ , by Kari Sutherland.

* * *

They arrive on Motunui with the evening tide, the wind at their backs and the sun beginning to retreat behind the familiar hills and mountains, streaking the clouds in reds and pinks. Even from this far off Moana can spot the beginnings of a crowd dispersing, visibly disappointed it's not anything more interesting than their future chief and her best friend returning from yet another adventure, and she barely contains a giggle as she adjusts the sail.

"Remember when they used to fill the beach just to see you arrive?"

Maui snorts from the prow. "Glad that's over," he says. "Don't get me wrong, I love your hospitality, but the formalities are always so … formal."

"We're still having the welcome, you know," she says. "You're still a guest."

She can't see it but the pout in his voice is almost palpable. "Aw, come on, I don't count as a local yet?"

"You? A local?" she says. "Remind me, how long were you away last time?"

He thinks about it, then he shrugs. "A month?"

"Try three."

"Really?" he says, and there's a note of genuine surprise in his voice despite her yelling that fact to him last time he landed. "And all this time I thought you just had some sort of freaky growth spurt."

Moana shakes her head and adjusts the course to avoid a familiar swell in the water that always dips down into a deceptive coral cluster. The newly repaired sail expands as it catches the wind, its hook and spiral glowing nearly orange in the setting sun, and the boat turns.

Maui doesn't even bother praising her for the call or the maneuvre, it's just that routine.

She smiles. Two years ago she wouldn't have been able to read the water topography, much less make that sharp a turn without capsizing. Now here she was, confidently delivering a demigod to her village while steering a type of vessel she herself reintroduced to her people. No one even thinks of any of it as a novelty anymore, it's just the way things are now. It's an odd time to reflect but she really had come a long way.

Her parents are waiting on the beach to greet them, just as they always are, and are visibly relieved when she steps onto the beach with no apparent injuries this time. The _hongi_ with Maui are quick and polite, no kneeling afterwards per Maui's wishes but Dad compromises with a slightly bowed head, for propriety's sake. Maui holds up his end of the exchange by nodding in thanks. Mom catches him off-guard in a hug.

It's hard to hear them over the terns returning to shore, but once her parents turn their attentions to her the pride and worry in their voices come through well enough.

"So?" Dad says, breaking away from his _hongi_ with Moana. "Is it finally clear in the east? Did you get them?"

She beams. "Got the last of the big ones in that area, and it brought its kids along with it," she says. "It'll be a while before we need to deliver anything back to Lalotai."

"Ha! Shoulda seen it, folks," Maui chimes in, a proud hand clapping onto her shoulder and the tattoos on his free arm already displaying their daring feats. "There I am, head injury, blood loss, the jaws of death about to rip me in half—"

Moana rolls her eyes, gently batting him away. "Maui," she says. "We can save it for dinner."

"But Mo, they'll like this one! You sing in it! There were babies involved!"

" _Maui_."

"Fine," he says, and then mumbles to her dad before he leaves to put the boat back in its usual shed, "But she really did sing."

Mother and daughter share a knowing smile as they shake their heads in mock disappointment.

The _hongi_ with Mom is quicker and gentler, none of Dad's grip like he was afraid of her leaving again but it does take her an extra second to break away. "Welcome home, minnow," she says, and sweeps her into a hug as well. "It hasn't been the same without you."

Moana swallows the lump in her throat once her dad joins the hug, and nearly loses it completely when she finds Pua at her feet.

"So what'd I miss?" she says, as they finally break away. "Was it a good harvest?"

Mom's smile is pure joy and light. "Best we've had in years," she says. "Oh, Moana, the crops haven't been this size since your father and I were your age. I'd thought we just imagined how much bigger they used to be."

The smile is contagious, and Moana finds herself matching it. "That's amazing, Mom," she says, and the smile turns into a wicked grin, "because I'm starving. Maui kept eating all the provisions."

Mom chuckles. "Well you'll have plenty to eat at dinner tonight, believe me."

"Mom," Moana says, "we talked about this. We can't hold a feast every time Maui sails in, we'll starve."

"Oh, the feast's not tonight," Dad says, "and it's certainly not for Maui."

She raises an eyebrow. "Wait, there's actually a feast?" she says. "When? What for?"

He has that look on his face he gets whenever he makes her a new gift or finds a particularly sweet fruit he thinks she'd enjoy, and it's a look she finds mirrored on Mom as both parents exchange glances and silently agree on something.

He's quieter now, almost conspiratorial. She could swear there's maybe even a bit of Gramma Tala in his eyes. "Can you wait a little longer for dinner?"

And despite the aches in her muscles and the protests from her stomach, she grins and nods.

* * *

They arrive in the voyaging boat shipyard to find Maui in hawk form, perched on the main mast of the chief's canoe. He lets out a happy but piercing cry when he sees them approach, and then shifts back into human form and slides down the mast like it's his canoe to welcome them to.

"Took you guys long enough!" He lands on deck with a soft thump and makes his way down to the beach. "So how about these canoes, huh? Looks like they've been doing some work while we were away! I'd say the fleet's good to go!"

Mom giggles as Dad visibly tries not to glower at Maui. His smile is tired, but reluctantly fond. "Yes, thank you, Maui," he says. "She can see that."

Maui grins. "You're wel—ohh!" he says, and shrinks like when Pua knows he's done something wrong. "Oh, you were going to tell her, weren't you?"

Dad sighs. "Yes."

"Sorry, Chief."

"It's okay, Maui, it's … " Dad thinks about it for a second before he seems to just give up trying to find the rest of the sentence. He shrugs, hands over Maui's customary bowl of food as a welcome before the kava ceremony, and tries, weakly, to keep some element of the surprise. "Anyway," he says to Moana, "the lashings are all secure, you've just missed us putting up the last of the sails today, we've tested all the seals—"

"Wait, they're done?" Moana says. "They're actually, finally finished? Already?"

"The harvest was good to us, minnow," Mom says. "It was just easier to bring everything in. We had extra time to work on this."

Moana is scrambling up the chief's canoe and up the mast before even she can realise it, because she has to see. She has to see the entire fleet from …

Oh.

Oh, it's _beautiful_.

"Yep! That's _your_ fleet, Chosen One!" Maui calls from the ground, his voice muffled by the pork. "Breathe it in! It smells like leadership!"

"Maui."

"Sorry, Sina."

Moana shakes her head and just lets herself take in the sea breeze and red sky. The sun's well behind Motunui's mountains now, and the light's about to go, and in the distance are fires beginning to dot various spots of the village. And there, all around her, her ancestors' canoes, restored to their former glory.

It was when they first started bringing out the boats from the Cave of the Ancestors that they first saw the true extent of the damage. They may have looked all right at first glance, but it didn't take long to see that the years had taken their toll. Torn and warped sails, masts and hulls giving way to rot or just general neglect, lashings so ancient they crumbled after the canoes came past the waterfall. It was a wonder Moana just happened to pick, not only the right size canoe for her mission to Te Fiti, but also a canoe that just happened to be seaworthy right from the get-go.

Maui had mentioned that before, that her boat had a completely different design from the boats of the first fleet. It had taken her a trip on his new canoe to see the difference and redo her own boat accordingly while repairs and restoration took place on the rest of the fleet.

And now here it was, whole, and new. She can just about see all these boats on the water, laden with people and supplies, cutting through the waters as they sail windward, by her command.

She shudders, equal parts sea breeze, equal parts excitement, and makes her way back onto the deck.

"So when do we set sail, Master Wayfinder?" her dad calls from the beach.

Moana looks at Maui, a question starting to form, when he shakes his head and defers to her.

"He asked you, not me, Chosen One," Maui says, and then pops another piece of pork in his mouth. "It's fine. You got this."

She beats down the warmth in her heart at his faith in her and forces herself to calm down and think.

"Maui and I could make the trip east right now," she says, "but I wouldn't recommend sending an entire fleet out in these conditions."

Mom nods. "So when will conditions be good?"

Another look at Maui, another quirked eyebrow and look of _no, you got this_.

He's right. She's ready, and he won't always be here. She will have to start making these sorts of calls on her own.

She looks out at the positions of the stars already starting to come out, notes where they are at this time of year, and takes stock of the direction of the wind.

It's about knowing where you're going in your mind, Maui had said, by knowing where you've been.

She thinks back to the route, both on the way out, and on the way back.

"We wait for the westerlies," she says. "They'll be here in a few weeks. That'll also give us enough time to prepare supplies and review our wayfinding lessons."

She tries not to sigh in relief when Maui thinks about it, then nods in approval. And if her dad's trying to stay neutral and chiefly as he replies, he's not doing a good job of it.

"If that's what our Master Wayfinder recommends," he says, and he's beaming while Mom shakes her head.

"All right, minnow, time to head back before the mosquitos get you," Mom says. "We still need to do the welcome."

Moana nods, climbs off back onto shore, and steals a piece of Maui's pork before she races him and Pua back to the guest _fale_.

* * *

Her cousin Lolo is the one to do the honours, as she tends to be whenever Moana herself is one of the people welcomed back to the village. There's nothing really noteworthy about the welcome. Lolo makes a good kava, no one breaches any protocols, and it's all uneventful and pleasant enough.

Though that might be what strikes her about the whole thing.

Two years ago Maui struggled valiantly and adorably to even get his head around what to do with the cup given to him. Now he's holding the cup and saying the blessings and going through all the motions like it's nothing. No one even so much as nods appreciatively at him doing it right, it's just that routine. He's not around as often as she'd like but he really wasn't kidding when he said he considered himself a local.

He doesn't need her to show him how to behave at the welcome anymore. Just like she doesn't need him to tell her when to send her fleet out.

And now, provided he doesn't go off on demigod business and return before the fleet launches, this will be the last time she'll be welcoming him as a resident of Motunui.

It's all been leading up to this. And despite all the work, all the preparation, all she's grown and all she's built, there's still that sense of surprise that yes, this is all happening.

Everything's going to change.

A nudge wrenches her back to the present, and the first thing she notices is the gap in Maui's teeth as he laughs like she's the most precious thing he's ever seen. "I said, you're already thinking about the launch, aren't you, Curly?"

She arches an eyebrow nice and high. "I don't remember mind reading being one of your powers."

"Don't need powers to read _your_ mind, Chosen One," he says, winking.

And she fights back a smile.

It's aggravating just how much she wants to smack him upside the head in front of everyone and call him a giant dork.

* * *

You could hear an acacia leaf fall in the silence of the grand _fale_ , it's that quiet.

The midday sun bears down on the roof and the heat seeps in through the fronds as the crowd, full-bellied and freshly cleaned, collectively holds its breath, all eyes on Maui. Even the attendants cleaning up the remains of the daytime feast, who've seen everything at this point and know how to look like they can't hear a thing, cast the occasional look in his direction as he weaves his tale.

And he's just soaking it up for all it's worth, drawing out the natural break in the story as long as they can stand it.

In the end it's Lolo of all people who breaks.

" _Then?_ "

Maui lets out a little huff of amusement. "Patience, princess, I'm building atmosphere."

"Not a princess," she calls from the crowd.

He continues like she hadn't said a thing.

"So there I am," Maui breathes, taking a moment to revel in the tension, "head injury—"

Soft gasps from all around him.

He smirks.

"Blood loss—"

Winces and sympathetic hisses of pain.

"The jaws of death about to rip me in half!"

Somewhere in the audience, at least two children burst into tears.

He's trying, Moana notices, he's really trying to stay in character and not just bask in their reactions.

"When Moana realises—"

"Moana," Mom murmurs from beside her.

"Yeah, Mom?" she says.

"Can we talk outside?"

Just about the whole village is there, rapt in the legend of Moana and Maui and the last creature of Lalotai in that part of the east—too busy to notice if, say, the chief's family were to slip out for a private talk. If there was any time to be safe from Motunui's infamous gossip problem, it would probably be now.

Moana winces. It's going to be this talk again, isn't it.

"Sure, Mom," she says. "We can talk."

Mom nods, and soon enough Moana is back home with her parents, rolling out the mats so they're not sitting on bare rock.

Not that she wouldn't prefer letting the cold of sitting on bare shaded stone just consume her before they ever have to have this talk again.

Her parents sit before her, doing that spooky mind reading thing again where they communicate what looks like entire conversations without so much as a word. It's a small eternity before they turn their attention back to her, smiling politely like it's just another day running the village and she's a farmer asking for permission to start a new field.

"Moana," Mom says, and Moana, through what she guesses is probably muscle memory or something, straightens her back and lowers her gaze in preparation for a reprimand.

Mom takes a second to string together the right words.

"Moana, you're nearly nineteen," she says.

Here we go.

"And your father and I aren't getting any younger."

Yep.

"We know how busy you've been, petal," Dad says, softly as he can, like she's six and still crying over not being able to go to the water. "That's why we've been patient, because you've had to be free to run around and do all this work."

Moana curls and uncurls her toes, picking gently at the edges of her hibiscus skirt exposed through the slit in her outer skirt.

"And it's paid off," Dad continues. "The fleet is ready, the way east is safe from monsters, we've begun to trade again, and you and Maui have brought wayfinding back to our island. Our people are ready to voyage again, thanks to you."

But … ?

"But," Mom says, "you can't put this off forever. As a woman, as the daughter of our highest chief, but most importantly, as the next chief of our people, this is something you need to do."

There is a softness and a pride in her voice when she adds, "You've earned it, Moana. You've been ready for this for years. It's time."

Moana sighs. They've never been this insistent before. They really mean it this time. It's going to happen. And they're right. This time she really does have no excuse.

"We made the arrangements during your last trip," Dad says. "And you'll have your cousins and some of the other girls joining you for their turn. Younger, I might add."

Moana winces again. "When?"

"Tomorrow," Mom says.

Tomorrow? That's so soon, she's barely even had time to know about it, let alone let it sink in that—

Moana starts when she realises Mom has moved from her mat to kneeling in front of Moana, gently cupping her face to bid her to look back up. "My silly little minnow," she says, and all the sternness and strength is gone for now, replaced by a fond, indulgent smile, "I'll never understand how you can run off on all these adventures, but still be scared of getting a few tattoos."

* * *

Not for the first time that week, Moana wakes up exhausted.

Of course, in the weeks before this, it was because she and Maui were at sea and taking turns at the controls, occasionally ignoring sleep to literally fight for their lives. This time, though, she's not sluggish, mumbling a plea for five more minutes before she's inevitably picked up and dragged towards the controls. Nor is she terrified, jolted awake by nightmares and desperately trying to stem the flow of tears as Maui holds her close and strokes her hair until it passes.

It's nothing anywhere near as dramatic. She just couldn't sleep last night, and now she's awake and can't go back to sleep. And that counts for something. Probably.

She's not even entirely sure it's even morning yet, going by the sounds of the night birds and the lack of chickens stirring. So it's … How long did she even sleep?

Pua in his creeping old age can't do as much as he used to. He's a little slower and a little more likely to nap instead of play, but he still wakes up just as soon as she does. In the soft light of the stars and moon and the distant flames of the village torches, she can see him blinking up at her, his head tilted with a question he can't ask.

She strokes him in reply even though they both know that doesn't really answer anything, packs up her bedroll, and heads out.

It rained while she slept, her feet and skin tell her, and the air has these pockets of air or breeze that just cuts right through her to settle in her bones. Pua doesn't complain at the mud, but she pats him on the head all the same and reassures him they'll be there soon. Not that he even needs to be told where _there_ is.

Sure enough it's sooner than they think to reach the fale with the newer, fancier tapa screens, its outside posts decorated in coconut fronds and the scent of oranges strongest near the eaves. She smiles in relief to hear Maui nearby and still awake, laughing harder than he should at some anecdote only he can hear.

"No," he says. " _No_. A shark, really? Why would you even get that close? Was it a really good fish, or—?"

Silence.

"Frigates. Go figure. I've been one and I still don't really get them."

More silence.

"You got that right."

Moana shakes her head, and approaches, Pua in tow. It doesn't take long at all for Maui to notice her.

"Uh-oh," he says, and then turns to the bright pink owl perched on his hook. "All right, Lulu, you know what this means. We're gonna have to call it a night."

She narrows her eyes.

"What'd we agree?" he says. "I turn you pink, you leave me alone when I say you leave me alone."

She screeches, and he holds up his hook towards the forest.

"Want me to bring this up to Tāne-matua?"

And she settles down, shrinking in on herself.

"All right, all right, look, calm down, I'm sorry. Didn't wanna actually freak you out," he says. "I still got a couple forest rats by the entrance. Go get 'em if you want."

So she does, and she screeches something like a goodbye or a thank you or both as she flies off into the night.

Maui can't bring himself to stay mad at her, and there's a fondness in his voice he can't completely mask. "See you, too, buddy," he says. "Tell the kids Uncle Maui says hi!"

Moana sidles up next to him, casually as she can. Nah, she's not bothered by anything, she just happens to be up in the middle of the night wandering around near his _fale_ for no reason at all. "Since when does Lulu get dirt on the frigates?"

"Lulu hears about everyone, Mo," Maui says. "Motunui's gossip problem doesn't just apply to the people."

It could be just because Maui mentioned it, it could be just because her eyes by now have adjusted to the light, or lack thereof. But she definitely notices more birds around them than she probably should, snatching up insects, devouring the odd fruit, or calling out into the night.

And a few of them, watching.

"I wouldn't be surprised," she says.

"So I'm guessing you didn't come here to talk about the noddy that got separated from the flock for the fifth time this week," he says, and gestures to his _fale_. "Another nightmare?"

Moana shakes her head as they head towards the steps. "Surprisingly," she says, "no."

"Stomach bug?"

"Not that."

He pauses. "Well you finished your monthlies on the way back, so it's not cramps … "

"Maui."

"Just running through my options, kid, you're not giving me a lot to go on."

She sits at the top of the steps, followed closely by Maui sitting beside her and Pua curling up at her feet, and lets her gaze drift towards the fires of the torches nearby.

This is beyond ridiculous. Mom was right, it doesn't make any sense for her to be this riled up over something that wouldn't hurt nearly as much as some of her actual injuries over the years. Seriously, tattoos? _Tattoos?_ After Lalotai, after kakamora, after taniwha and gods and elementals and giant lizards and the occasional spirit? Nightmares, bleeding, burns, scarring, the odd broken bone, and she's scared of a few pokes from a little thorn in her very safe village?

"Mo," Maui says, "you're pouting."

She loosens her mouth from its obvious pout. " _You're_ pouting."

Maui chuckles and shuffles closer to her, his hook set to one side and his huge shoulder ready if she needs to lean on something.

"Remember the first time you came here for one of these talks?" he says. "You stared out at that torch, I think, like there was something about it that just made everything better. Wouldn't even look at me until stuff got really heavy."

He sighs, and from her peripheral vision she can see him beginning to follow her gaze.

"Can't say I blame you," he says. "Fire, right? It can really hurt, and it can kill you if it dies too early, but you treat it right and appreciate it and … "

He stops.

"Listen to me," he says. "Rambling when something's bringing you here in the middle of the night." His worry starts to burrow into his words, and there's that familiar feeling of his concern beginning to bore right through her. "So what's eating you, kid?"

Moana winces, drags a hand down her face.

"It's stupid."

"Need I remind you, Lulu asked me for a _year_ to turn her pink," he says. "Try me."

"You're gonna laugh."

"Oh," he says, and he turns to face her better and settles into a cross-legged position as he leans forward. "Oh, this is about Lasalo the fisherman getting married while we were away, isn't it?"

… What.

"What?" she says.

"I've seen you eyeing him, Mo, I don't blame you, he's cute," Maui says. "What I'm concerned about is that you choose now when it's too late to tell me, your best bud? I could've helped. I've been trying to help. But you're so bad at making any moves or picking up on hints it's no wonder he went with—"

"Maui."

"—Though, like, could you still be wife number two eventually? Or is that not a thing for lady chiefs?" he says. "I was out of it for a thousand years. I'm a bit rusty on the—"

" _Maui_ ," she says.

And he stops. "Not the cute fisherman?"

"You've been talking with the gossips too much."

"I told you," he shrugs, "I'm local now."

She tries to summon some annoyance with him.

She can't.

"So what is it, then?" he says. "Something to do with why you left me hanging just before I needed you to sing that song?"

She smirks. "So much for mind reading."

"Hey."

Mini Maui adds another point to the scoreboard, just to mess with him, and he growls in response.

Moana yawns, draws herself up as well, and leans against him, his arm giving way to let her into her usual position of using his lap as a huge pillow while she talks.

"Maui," she says, a glance up at Mini Maui back in his usual position of lifting the sky, "how did it feel to get your tattoos?"

He blinks, frowns, and once it sinks in she can just about hear the squeal building up in his chest and leaking out of him. "Moana of Motunui!" he says. "Is this what all the fuss was about? Are you getting tattooed tomorrow?"

She sighs. "Yes," she says. "Me and a bunch of other eligible girls."

He bites his lip, which somehow just causes more of the squeal to escape. "My little voyager!" he says. "Off to get her _malu_ at last. Soon you'll be all grown up and discovering the world, setting up all these new villages, and—"

She sighs again, and lets her eyes slip shut for a moment to just take it in, the feel of Maui's lap under his _lavalava_ , the coldness of the stone floor beneath them, still a bit damp from the rain, Pua's soft snoring nearby, the scent of the oranges hanging from the rafters.

"Yeah," she says, and opens her eyes again to see that concern back on his face.

"Thought you'd be more excited about this, kid," he says. "C'mon, you earned this years ago!"

"I'd thought so too." She frowns. "Though you did probably figure out my problem."

"I did?"

She sits back up. "I think I've been nervous because … because the tattoos are the first step before all these other big changes," she says. The tiredness is gone for now, and it's like she's figuring out a monster's weak spot or spotting a riptide before anyone else does. "I'll be leaving Motunui. I'll be setting up whole new villages. I'll be accepting suitors, settling down, raising an heir, you'll be busy doing demigod stuff, and I—"

"Woah, woah, woah, Chosen One," Maui says. "Getting kind of ahead of yourself there, don't you think?"

She stops. "Yeah," she says. "I guess I am. But that doesn't mean it's not all gonna happen. I'm excited, but it's scary, you know?"

He shuffles a bit closer, and ruffles her hair. "You goofball," he says, unfazed by her attempts to bat him away. "You'll be fine, just have to take it one step at a time. How old you turning this year, anyway, twelve, thirteen? Plenty of time to sort things out."

She snorts as she fixes it back into place. "Maui," she says. "I'm turning nineteen. And I was sixteen when we met."

The smile wavers, and there's that look of surprise again—the same one, come to think of it, whenever she informs him he's been away longer than he thinks. "I knew that."

She leans against him, and his arm takes a second before it settles into its familiar way of lazily draping around her. A tattoo comes into view, one from his forearm, of creatures that might be dogs with what looks like people inside.

She gives his arm another look, lets her gaze wander up the arm into the motifs that aren't found on the tattoos of her island, and then across onto the other arm, onto more shapes and symbols that don't show up in Motunui, and finally the edges of the little panel of his tattoo of an eight-eyed bat.

"Looking for design ideas, Chosen One?" he says.

"More like looking for a story," she says, and then clarifies, "I'm nervous, okay! It's gonna be a whole day of pain tomorrow. I need to remember my tattoos are gonna come with some cool stories to make up for it."

He scoffs. "Curly, we've known each other for … some number of years. I wanna say two."

"Nearly three."

"Close enough," he says. "What could I possibly tell you that I haven't already?"

She squints, scanning over him even though she could probably draw his tattoos from memory if she wanted to. They were voyaging buddies, often sharing a small boat together for weeks at a time. They'd probably seen every inch of each other by now.

And yet …

The scent of oranges wafts in through a breeze passing through his _fale_ 's open screens, and she does remember that night now, the first time she found herself here with him at some unreasonable hour, needing someone to talk to.

He sang to her that night, indulging some barely-awake request for something, anything to help her sleep without the nightmares. And he'd said something just as she was nodding off, something about the last time he had to sing that lullaby.

She gets to her feet, and Maui tilts his head as she surveys what she can of him in what little light there is.

"Um," he says, as she pauses at his back, "pretty sure I already told you about my parents."

"No, not—" She shakes her head, and continues to look.

On Motunui, tattoos come with meaning, and each tattoo is unique to the owner. That's why the idea of copying someone's tattoos exactly wasn't that far off from saying you wanted to wear their skin. Especially if you were a man and had the tattoos on your shoulder and on the lower half of your body, put the right patterns in the right combinations and you'd be telling the world your history, your occupation, what you hold valuable, and any number of other things. Your tattoos were personal, and it wouldn't be unusual to see tattoos representing lovers, spouses, children, just about anyone you held close. True, Maui's tattoos did tend to lean more on the literal side, nowhere near as abstract as her village's aesthetic, but that probably made this even more confusing.

"Kid?" he says, and he twists around a little to at least try to see her. "You okay back there?"

"Yeah, just … "

"What?"

She looks again, circles back around, and goes back to sitting in front of him. There's a quick scan of the tattoos on his front again, and … no. Not there either.

How did she never notice before?

"Can't find any new ones, huh?" he says. "I told you, you might've seen them all."

She shakes her head again. "No," she says. "No, that's not it."

He frowns. "What's not it?"

She thinks back again, back to that night, as she drifted in and out of consciousness, yawning against his huge soft shoulder. He did say. He said he'd talk about it. She remembers, she was too tired to ask him later, and then life just got in the way and she forgot.

"Moana?"

Until now.

"Maui," she says, "didn't you say you had kids?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes:**

Right, I've mentioned this in _Breathe It In_ , but it probably bears repeating because this one is going to be heavy on the backstory. It's hard to reconcile the Disney Maui with the Maui from various stories, because he varies. A lot. His name's not even Maui in some places. So, okay, New Zealand has the Maui stories I'm most familiar with, as well as the humour and confidence I recognise in the Disney Maui, not to mention the man sure likes his haka. But the Disney Maui is a mixture and his backstory is taken from all over the place and mixed up here and there, so let's just say he's from Hawaiki and leave it at that. I'll also be mixing stories here and there to keep him ambiguous, no offence meant and it's nowhere near intended to be fully faithful versions of the original stories, but please feel free to let me know if anything's gone too far.

Okay, let's push on, shall we?

 **Warnings for some mentions of violence.**

* * *

It's not often she remembers just how old Maui is, just how many generations of mortals he'd seen come and go, how many he'd probably forgotten.

Sure, his sense of time was all over the place. He'd understand how days and months worked in theory, could tell you the exact time of year from a glance at the stars or time of day from a glance at the sun, but time as a limited resource? That was harder. He's an immortal, one who gained immortality instead of being born with it, and he's had so much time he's long since lost all sense of proportion about it, like a chief with so many red feathers and fine mats it never mattered how many he'd give away. A year could be a day could be a week, as far as Maui was concerned.

And, okay, there was the quiet weirdness of realising she was slowly catching up to him in terms of apparent age, while he stayed the same. That didn't freak her out as much as it did him. Probably.

But all that aside, this was Maui, wasn't it? He gossips with the weavers and gets into arguments with birds. He steals Moana's food and plays with Motunui's children and defers to Moana's parents the way anyone would to an elder. Mentally and physically, he's a young man in his prime.

Until he isn't.

Sometimes, just sometimes, the spell would break and the mask would slip, and they could no longer pretend he was just like them. The young man would give way to a myth, to an ancient unknowable thing that would fill her with awe, and, more than once, terror.

And she's not sure what she's feeling now.

For a moment he's old again, thousands of years of struggle and knowledge weighing down on his shoulders as he searches through an unfathomable backlog of memories. But he catches the mask quicker than usual, fixes it back on before most people would even notice it slipped.

It's regular old Maui looking back at her when he asks, "When did I tell you about my kids?"

She smooths down the goosebumps and shrugs, eyes on the nearest available tattoo. "You talk about your families sometimes," she says. "Your wives, here and there. And there was that one time you hijacked a whole school and said you were a dad, you know how kids work."

He chuckles, shaking his head. "Yeah," he says. "That was a fun field trip."

"They started a fire."

"I said fun, not safe."

Moana picks at the exposed bits of hibiscus skirt visible from the slit in her outer skirts. "And … "

She trails off, considers again if she didn't just dream up the whole thing in her sleep deprivation, or dream up everything just now in her current sleep deprivation.

"Hmm?"

The torch continues to cast unsteady, wavering waves of light on her skirt, and the scent of oranges continues to waft past, drifting off towards her and the frond-covered posts.

She stops picking.

"You said you had daughters," she says. "The first time we had one of these talks, that time you sang to me, you said you sang that song to your daughters whenever they had nightmares."

There's a pause before Maui replies, "Yeah."

"You also said you'd tell me about them," she says. "About what happened to them that caused the nightmares."

It's still regular Maui in front of her when she deigns to look back up, regular Maui wincing and rolling a floor pebble between his fingers as he considers his next words.

"I told you it wasn't a bedtime story, kid."

"You said so yourself," she says. "I'm not exactly a kid anymore."

He's looking over her, not in the leery way others sometimes look at her, or in the indifferent evaluations by the council or various foreign chiefs to determine marriageability, but in this sort of disbelief, like he needed to confirm her claim, that she's not the sixteen-year-old he met nearly three years ago, that yes, it really had been nearly three years, and yes, that's long enough to make a difference at this stage in her mortal life.

And she finds that look of surprise again.

Maui grows quiet, or at least a little more still, as the torchlight continues to flicker in the soft nighttime breeze.

"Maui?" she says.

He shrugs, and his voice comes out strained, and far too measured and even.

"They, uh," he says.

He swallows. It's a couple seconds avoiding her eyes completely when he continues.

"They watched their brothers get killed."

And it's like an unseen current, or a squall Moana never saw coming. She had hoped it would be more of the sort of thing that all kids had nightmares about, a sweet story where the kids would come crying to their big tough demigod dad about the darkness, the creatures of the forest, the shrieks of the owls in the middle of the night. Something with a good ending, with a few scares but hope in the end. Wasn't that how his stories usually went? Not this. Never anything like this.

"Oh," she breathes, and it's everything she can stand to not crush him in a hug right now. "Oh, Maui, I'm sorry, I didn't think—If you wanna talk about something else we can—"

He shrugs again, and his smile is broken. "No, no," he says. "Not your fault. Besides, this'll be good for me. I need to keep telling these stories, otherwise I'll forget. I tell the public version of this long enough I'll start believing it."

Public version?

"Maui—"

He holds up a hand.

And she forces herself to settle down, forces herself to stay still. Maui needs space whenever he has to talk about the bad stuff, needs it like she needs touch in the same situations, and it's killing her not to at least put her hand on his and tell him it'll be okay.

The years are weighing down on him again as his eyes go far off into the void she would sometimes find him in, and when he speaks his tattoos are almost eerily still.

"This lady I met on this island south of here," he says, and then reconsiders. "No. No, not south, it was east of here, we—"

He stops.

He's oddly silent, unnaturally silent, as a quiet moment of horror seems to pass through him. Moana's confused until she can just about feel it passing on into her, and she has to hold in a gasp as she finally understands.

He doesn't remember. He _can't_ remember. The memory is lost, and he's grasping through the fog to grab whatever details he can get.

Maui swallows.

"One of those, anyway," he says. "And she had this husband, this real piece of work. She left him, went off to find someone new, but no one wanted her. No one wanted to get on the guy's bad side."

And impossibly, the pain gives way to a smile— small, and distant, but sweet, and real.

"And then she found me."

It's not often Maui talks about his personal life, and it's even less often that he speaks of it well. And it's a strange look on him, this side of him even she hardly gets to see, but she wouldn't exactly call it unwelcome.

She actually almost wishes he showed it more.

"What was she like?" she says, a quick scan of his tattoos in case she missed a tiny figure somewhere. "Was she nice? Sarcastic? Both? Did she join in on any of your adventures or did she—?"

No, she's not there in the tattoos, either.

He's searching his memories again, grasping, before he moves on like she never said a thing.

"Her name was Hina," he says, and chuckles. "One of quite a few women in my life named Hina. When it wasn't Sina. I dunno. Maybe I have a type."

He stops, rubbing awkwardly at his wrist. "Not that I'm eyeing your mom," he says, and adds, "Not that she isn't a very nice, very pretty lady, I'm just saying I noticed that because she's very nice and very pretty, not because I want to—"

He's dragging a hand down his face now.

"You get what I mean," he says. "Don't tell your dad."

Moana stifles a giggle, and the weight is gone from Maui's shoulders for now.

"So we settle down," Maui says, "have a few kids. Demigod business keeps me away more than I'd like but I do my part when I can. Sing them to sleep, wake them up for chores, bail them out whenever they got into fights—y'know, dad stuff. It's as normal a life a guy like me could hope for."

Normal. Now that was a word she'd never associate with Maui, not after what she's seen, what they've been through. But his voice is softening, and there's that distant smile, and it really is strange to imagine the boisterous young man come home to a regular old home, and just set his hook to the side be a normal husband, an ordinary dad.

"How is it?" she says. "Being married, having kids."

He chuckles. "It's, uh," he says. "Freezing cold feet against your legs, middle of the night. And you have more fights than you'd think about what to eat. Babies randomly stop breathing and they only start again when you panic. And don't get me started on trying to get them to eat anything new—or worse, when they can't get enough of the new thing."

Moana grins. "Did they throw away the food with their super strength?"

"You think my kids had powers?" he says.

She's tilting her head when she asks, "They didn't?"

"Born human, remember?" he says, and the ease in the air and the softness in his voice begin to fade away. "Can't pass on what isn't mine to give."

She's searching for the words again, stumbling over them, and all she can say is, "Oh."

He's back to not meeting her eyes, to letting the years weigh down on his shoulders as the torches flicker in the distance and Pua snores softly at their feet.

Moana readjusts her legs, draws up her knees to weather another breeze.

"So what happened?" she says, and looks up to find that the young man is gone again.

The hairs on Moana's arms prickle as she tries to hold in the awe Maui insisted she can't give him anymore and the fear that always breaks Maui's heart to see in her.

Not that he'd probably even notice right now.

"He found us," he says, and she's no longer talking to regular old Maui.

She steadies herself. She's faced demons, monsters, actual gods. She can't feel this way around Maui anymore. "The ex."

Maui nods, as if he even needed to.

"Started with the wife," he says. "Hina went out for … something. Food, maybe, or water. He found her, tried to woo her back, tried to _force_ her back, and Hina, she put up a fight, got away, came straight home to warn me and the kids."

Not for the first time this night, Moana notices Mini Maui, Maui's first choice of storytelling aid, doesn't so much as twitch.

Moana frowns.

"Why couldn't you fight him off?" she says. "Aren't you allowed to fight mortals?"

"I am, if it calls for it," Maui says, "but I never said he was mortal."

There's a mental tally of the tattoos, both the ones he normally has and the ones that show up when he needs to tell a story or make a point. But she can't—No one seems to fit the description of that exact situation, and Mini Maui continues to remain uncharacteristically still.

"He was a shapeshifter," Maui answers before she can ask. "He could take on human form if he wanted, but that's not what he was."

"So what was he?"

He gathers himself, and Moana's hairs raise further.

"Tunaroa," he says, and his hand has drifted back to his hook, grasping it, and letting go. "The eel god."

What.

He had never mentioned that part. She's travelled with him for years and the eel story never even hinted at that part.

"The eel you killed?" she says. "The one from the coconut story?"

He sighs. "Yeah."

And his hand slides back into his lap.

And she has no idea what to do, how to react. He needs space but he also needs to be reminded to come out of that void before he's in it too long and she sure doesn't seem to be handling this well, but—

Her hand is on his before she knows it, and she has no idea if it's to bring him back to the present or just calm herself down, but he starts at the touch, and he softens, and the person she recognises as Maui begins to emerge.

He grips at the edge of the platform, and lets go slowly.

"Couple of my boys saw I was preparing to get rid of him and wanted to see what the fuss was about," he says. "Their sisters tried to stop 'em, but … they were nosy, you know? Too curious and sneaky for their own good. Like their dad."

He stops again, blinking back in vain to block the imminent flow of tears. There's a sniffle, a subdued little cough, and he continues with little more than a bit of hoarseness in his voice.

"I found out about it after," he says, "When their sisters came running to me in tears. For a second, I hoped, when he ate them, maybe he swallowed them whole. I mean, he was huge, least as big as some of the Lalotai monsters. Maybe I'd find them still alive in his stomach. "

Moana winces at the bile rising up her throat.

"And did you?"

There's a broken, almost desperate laugh.

"My daughters were covered in blood, Moana," he says. "Most of it wasn't theirs."

The torchlight in the distance continues to dance across his face, and Moana grits her teeth as another pocket of cold cuts right through her to settle into her bones.

She had seen Maui broken like this once before, on a morning she'd always hold safe in her most precious memories. She knew what to say then, what he needed to hear, but she's no orator. The words come when they want, and all she can think to do, which she can't do now, is to hold him.

Maui, the trickster, the figure of myth, who could ten times charm sacred fire from a goddess and hold entire villages captive with his stories, can't find a way forward, either. There's more he's not saying, somewhere in his huge heart, but he passes over it, and finds another pebble on the floor to roll between his fingers.

"Told you it wasn't a bedtime story," he says, and the smirk in his voice is fractured and wet.

Moana chokes back a sob.

"Maui," she says, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked, I shouldn't have pushed it."

"Hey, c'mon, don't start, you'll get me going, too."

She's sniffling now, and her eyes are stinging as her throat begins to constrict, and it physically hurts to keep herself from letting it escalate any further, but that will have to do.

"It was—" she clears her throat, takes a breath, gives the ache in her chest a moment to pass. "It was selfish, Maui. I was prying. That was a horrible thing to ask you to relive."

He shrugs. "Any other person, yeah, maybe," he says. "But I promised you I'd tell you, didn't I? I said so two years ago."

"Nearly three."

"See, that's even worse, I'm more overdue than I thought," he says, and the concern gives way to a soft smile. He chuckles at himself. "Could've sworn I had a point to this," he says. "Gimme a sec, I gotta try remember what it is."

"A point?" she says. "Maui, what point could there be in me forcing you to tell this story?"

It's now that Mini Maui stirs to life on the panel where he lifts the sky, and though the torchlight isn't great and the clouds are beginning to dim the stars, he's very clearly nodding in some sort of understanding.

Maui, meanwhile, takes one look at the tattoo and remembers what he was looking for.

"Oh," he says. "Right."

He's rubbing at his wrist again before he gives a little glimpse at the shoulder with the panel of the coconut tree.

"I'm telling you this because, yeah, it's sad. Life gets sad sometimes. But you know what? Life goes on," he says, "and it's up to you to make the most of the good days."

He lets himself stare out into the village.

"Rua and Rangi would've loved to know something beautiful came out of their deaths," he says. "And my daughters from that day, Haeata, Ngaire, and Waitā? Each lived to at least ninety. Full lives, lots of adventures, a few grandkids for Grampa Maui to play with."

"But Maui—"

"I've outlived all my kids, Moana. My parents, my siblings, every nephew and niece and all of their kids, every wife, every mortal who ever came on an adventure with me, every person I've ever shared a night with, I've lost them all in some form or another," he says. "You live as long as I do that's just something you learn to carry around."

He's quiet again, frowning as he struggles to figure out what to say next.

She had thought that the surprise was what would hurt the most, that painful little reminder that he didn't have as much time with her as he thought. But as he's looking over her now, in the light of the clouded stars and the village torches beginning to dim, and when she sees there's no more surprise in his face, she reconsiders.

This is what hurts most, probably: not the bemused shock, but the moment he really starts to accept all of this.

She is older, older than he'd thought. And she is changing, faster than he'd thought, and despite how happy they are now, she is just another mortal, and he isn't.

"You were looking at my tattoos earlier," Maui says, "and you were wondering why my families don't get their likenesses up here."

She winces. "Was it that obvious?"

"I told you," he says, "I don't need powers to read your mind."

And the warmth in his smile is almost enough to fight the chill of the morning breeze.

He cricks his neck, gets up for a little stretch, and sits down on her other side so the coconut tree tattoos are in her direction. But he doesn't face her. Instead he's looking out at the fading torchlight, and she can see him letting the words slot together before he speaks.

"There were more people in the tattoos," he says. "Every family is here, all in the symbols, and I can recite the genealogies in my sleep, but there used to be figures, too, just like this little guy."

Mini Maui continues to hold up the sky, steadfast at his post.

Maui's hand comes up to the generic crowd in his sun snaring tattoo. "These people here," he says, "some of them used to be my brothers, and they had ropes of their own. They show up again here, in the island pulling one. Or they did, before the gods removed them."

Down to the giant bat panel. "My wife, Kumulama," he says. "She was in this scene, being held captive."

And up to the coconut tree and the giant eel. "And you can probably guess who used to be here."

He answers her question before she asks it.

"I asked the gods to remove the figures, just replace them with other things from the story. Privacy thing, I said. Don't want everyone getting too nosy when I'm trying to tell them my exploits," he says. "But I think they knew. Probably didn't help that these requests tended to come after someone died. Sometimes they'd refuse. Most times they got it."

The morning chill cuts clean through Moana, and she watches as the nearest torch struggles to recover from the latest gust of wind.

Maui follows her gaze back to the dying fire.

"It hurts to lose them," he says. "But it hurts even worse to realise you've forgotten them, when it hits you that after long enough, they've just become a name and this sadness you can never explain."

His eyes are back on her, and she can feel his love piercing through the cold, but Moana swallows back tears and refuses to look anywhere but the torch.

"You get to live a normal life, Moana, a human life. You get to remember everyone," he says. "That's something to look forward to. Yeah, it's scary, and it'll get rough sometimes, but you're you, and you'll get through anything."

His voice comes out clipped again, far too measured, far too even.

"And I am … happier than you'd ever guess," he says, "to know I get to watch you grow up."

She fights the sting in her eyes and the ache in her chest, and leans her head against his shoulder. His arm gives way to drape around her, and she takes a moment to just breathe in the cold and the scent of oranges, and lean into his warmth.

Her throat is clear and her voice is steady when she asks the question that's been haunting her since he started the story.

"So what's gonna happen to—?"

He looks down at the tattoo over his heart.

"To this?"

"Yeah."

"I only remove the tattoos of the people I actually like, Chosen One."

She lets out a huff of amusement. "Maui."

"Kidding, I'm kidding," he says. "So serious."

He leans his head against hers, and his hold tightens, just a little.

"I'm done forgetting," he says. "And I don't ever wanna forget you, Moana."

She smiles.

And she tries to believe him.

See, despite the warmth in her heart and the feeling that everything will be okay, she has to remind herself that Maui lies. He doesn't lie to her, but he lies when he needs to. It's part of the deal of becoming a trickster demigod, and he can be very good at it. But the thing is, and she's not sure if he knows it yet, the person he's best at lying to is himself.

He probably means what he said, but then he probably also meant it every time he promised not to forget.

She plasters on a smile, just as the torchlight dies.

"You better not," she says. "Once I settle my new island I'm gonna get my own Mini Maui, right here, on my shoulder. I'll make him high five your Mini Moana by just ramming into you."

He snorts. "Like to see you try to reach, Shortstack."

"And a big hawk, right across my back."

"That's not even my favourite form."

"Well, too bad, show-off, it's your most famous one."

And they laugh, as the clouds give way and the stars re-emerge from the darkness.

Moana breaks away from him, and wakes Pua up to snuggle into her lap. The little pig complies without complaint, and she takes comfort in his steady breathing as she strokes his head.

She can barely see Maui as her eyes readjust to the starlight, his tattoos even less so. It's probably for the best.

She smooths down her goosebumps.

"Hey Maui," she says.

"Yeah?"

"If you wanna … I mean, just if it's okay with you. You said you need to keep telling these stories, otherwise you'll forget," she says. "You ever wanna talk about the people you removed, jog your memory, I'm here."

There is silence.

And then, a chuckle.

"Motunui and its gossip problem," he says, and she can just about hear him rolling his eyes.

She hears the sound of him running his hand through his hair and readjusting his position, tapa rubbing against stone as he shuffles to face her better.

"What do you wanna hear about first?"

* * *

They talk in the darkness until the stars fade into the dawn.

After all, she's a wayfinder. She can skip a night's sleep if she needs to, and she gets the feeling this is the first time he's gotten to talk about these people at least a thousand years.

So he does, and though he fumbles here and there with certain details he can still weave a story with what he has. It's the genealogies he never skips a beat on, reciting names and lineages as easy as breathing, and there are hundreds of names, over countless generations, and, quietly, it occurs to Moana just how much earth there is beneath them, just how much history it buried, how many entire civilisations it swallowed up that Maui has personally seen come and go.

She learns too late it's a mistake to ask for any information he didn't already provide. The years had worn on his memories, and the people she would've most liked to learn about—his brothers, his parents, his earliest friends—are by now scrubbed of all but the barest details.

The horror passes through him again when it hits that he can no longer remember what they looked like, how some of them died.

Names, and a vague sadness, and little more beyond that.

He's in the middle of an absolutely ridiculous story from his youth, about how he used a chicken, a dog, and a coffin to find a new husband for one of his earliest wives, when the sun seeps through the darkness and dissipates the cold. Pua stirs awake, a fowler with a pigeon net passes them by, and the night birds give way to the calls of the sparrows.

The light falls on Maui's tattoos, and something inside her shifts.

She does have a whole life to look forward to, and she will make the most of the days she has left. Because one day she'll become one of them, just a name and a story and not much else. Even Maui will forget what she looked like, her favourite foods, the way she'd find any excuse to get or give a hug. Moana will become a part of history, but her time as a part of memory will end.

But if she's lucky—if _he's_ lucky—someone else will come along, and help him remember.

Life gets sad, but life goes on.

And that probably comforts her more than it should.

She's ready for the ceremony today.

And as soon as she gets a new settlement up and running, she's going to get that Mini Maui tattoo.

* * *

By all objective measures, the conditions couldn't be more ideal for the launch. The westerlies arrived just in time, the weather lately promised easy passage for at least the beginning of the route, and the growing season had a few stragglers behind to give just that little extra for provisions. If she didn't know better she could've sworn Maui called in a few favours to give her fleet the best possible start.

Not that she would be even the tiniest bit surprised if it turns out that's exactly what he did.

But even so, she can't help but feel a little pang as she says goodbye to Motunui. It's weird; this is the island she felt for so long held her captive, and now she's all emotional at the thought of leaving for somewhere new.

Maui takes another banana out of the nearest provisions basket being carried up into the boats. "No," he says. "Kid, no, don't start, you'll get me started, too."

She rolls her eyes, smooths down her skirt, adjusts her headdress. "No stray leaves?"

"Nope, Huali worked extra long on that one," Maui says. "That skirt's gonna last you all the way till landing."

"Good," she says, one more look out at the clouds, one more look back up to the chief's peak.

Maui takes a bite of the banana. "You sure there's no more swelling or peeling?"

"I told you, stop checking, it's fine," she says. "I've been able to run around for at least a week now."

He swallows.

"A week." Maui frowns. "Maybe a little more recovery won't hurt."

" _Maui_ ," she giggles. "I'm okay. Really."

He's squinting at her, and there's a quick head tilt as he examines her legs for … no real reason, apparently, because her skirts completely covered her tattoos anyway, before he seems to catch himself being overprotective and sighs. "Fine."

She elbows him on his side. "You goofball."

He can't help but smile in response.

Moana looks back onto the shore, where her cousin Selia stands among the crowd, his brand new chief's headdress and whale tooth necklace shining in the sunlight as dancers and musicians lead the crowd in its joyous song of farewell. And on the other side, towards the sea, the fleet steadily moving into the water, boat by boat laden with people and supplies. This is happening. This is the launch.

She shudders, equal parts sea breeze, equal parts excitement, and leaps up into Maui's arms for a hug. He's startled before he recovers and hugs her back.

"Could've warned me, kid," he says. "Kinda still eating."

Her laugh is shaky but genuine.

"You'll visit, right?" she says. "On our new island?"

He snorts. "You gonna name it Maui?"

"I told you, not even if it looks exactly like you."

"Then maybe once every fifteen years."

She rolls her eyes. "Maui."

"Kidding, I'm kidding." He sets her back down, just drinking in the look of her as a leader now, a master wayfinder. "Often as I can. I'll become a local. I'll build my own _fale_. You'll start begging me to go away."

She struggles for dignity despite the warmth in her chest, the sting in her eyes.

"I'll track you down if you don't," she says, her voice trembling. "Demigod business or no demigod business."

There's a hitch in Maui's breath. "Aw, no, I said don't start!"

" _You_ don't start!" she says. "You'll make _me_ start!"

Pua chooses this moment to sit between them, his head tilted as he gazes up at the banana in Maui's hand.

And somehow that's enough to send Maui over the edge.

"Here you go, li'l guy," he says, gently placing the banana into the pig's waiting mouth. "One for the road. You stay safe."

Moana fights the smile pulling at her lips. "Maui, you're crying."

He wipes away the two huge, obvious tears threatening to spill from the corners of his eyes. "No, I'm not."

"You big softie. You _are_."

"Shut up," he says. " _You're_ crying."

And she laughs, because he's right.

Which makes their resulting _hongi_ of goodbye an embarrassing mess.

Maui's voice is soft and his touch is gentle as he helps her and Pua up onto the chief's boat, where her parents and relatives wait with pride.

"You got this, Moana," he says, his eyes sparkling and his grin showing off the gap in his teeth, before he heads back down to the shore and helps the others push her boat into the water. There is a flash of light behind her as the boat gains buoyancy, followed by an unusually-marked tern flying off towards some other island.

All around her the other boats make way for the chief's canoe to lead the way, and on her own vessel everyone begins to take their positions, Dad at the oar, Huali at the prow, Mom and Auntie Tafi with the plants and animals, and all the others either out of the way or manning the ropes.

A thrill passes through her.

This is it. This is everything she's worked for.

Her people are voyagers again.

And she's ready to lead them.

Moana smiles, and looks out onto the horizon.


End file.
